Insect borne diseases are a major non-battle injury threat to the military. Seven of the top eleven diseases that reduce military effectiveness are transmitted by insects. It is imperative for peak military operational efficiency that an acceptable insect repellent be produced to reduce the disease threat and to provide personal protection from insect borne diseases. The insect repellent must also meet the unique requirements necessary for personal protection of the armed forces. When considering the broad spectrum of use, the repellent should be long lasting and acceptable to the user. Also, the military spends long periods of time outdoors and accordingly, an acceptable sunscreen and insect repellent combination for use by field military personnel is highly desirable, particularly if it is compatible with other military materials, such as clothing and weapons. In other words, the composition should not have a negative effect on uniforms or the use and operation of weapons.
The military services have not developed a satisfactory sunscreen insect repellent composition that meets their unique operating needs.
A second major need exists for people who live and work and play in the outdoors. They have protected themselves from insects for years by using insect repellents. Likewise, people who live and play and work outdoors have used suntan compounds to accelerate the darkening of the exposed skin. Only recently the knowledge that the sun's ultraviolet rays causes skin cancer has caused people to switch from suntan lotions to sunscreening lotions that provide protection from the sun. These lotions are measured on a scale of increasing protection from 1 to 50. The scale is called the Sun Protection Factor ("SPF"). The SPF value of a sunscreen allows the consumer to determine the degree of sunburn protection that he or she is willing to accept for a given period of time in the direct exposure to the sun's ultraviolet rays.
Many civilian products have become commercially available in the recent past that combine sunscreen lotions and insect repellent lotions in one package. These products, for many reasons, are not completely satisfactory. Some of the reasons why they are not satisfactory are as set forth below.
First, the insect repellent compositions available are greasy, have a foul odor, and are usually effective only for short periods and require the person to continuously apply the lotion to maintain the desired degree of insect repellency on the skin. In many cases, as, for example, in a duck blind this is very inconvenient, because the person in the duck blind cannot repeatedly apply the insect repellent lotion while remaining perfectly motionless.
Second, many combination insect repellent and sunscreen compositions are easily removed with water. This is a particular problem in the summertime when the person sweats. The effectiveness of the insect repellent and sunscreen composition is dramatically reduced due to sweat removing the composition from the skin.
Third, most insect repellent compositions are oily and offensive to the olfactory system of the wearer as well as to those people who are around the wearer.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,170,185, entitled "MENTHYL ANTHRANILATE AND PROCESS OF PREPARING SAME", issued on Aug. 22, 1939 to M. S. Carpenter discloses a suntan cream having menthyl anthranilate which is a menthyl ester of anthranilic acid.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,434,154, entitled "TANNING AND ULTRA-VIOLET SCREENING COMPOSITION HAVING HIGH STABILITY", issued on Feb. 28, 1984 to J. E. McShane discloses a tanning and screening composition that is highly stable after prolonged storage. The composition is alleged to be useful, even after such prolonged storage, for shielding human skin from the harmful ultraviolet rays of the sun.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,701,321, entitled "LIQUID DETERGENT WITH SUNSCREEN AGENT", issued on Oct. 20, 1987 to J. E. Bernstein discloses a liquid detergent with a sunscreen agent selected from the aminobenzoic acid family, the other components of the composition being a preservative, a non-ionic detergent, an amphoteric detergent, or a mixture thereof in an aqueous vehicle.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,820,508, entitled "SKIN PROTECTIVE COMPOSITION", issued on Apr. 11, 1989 to M. S. Wortzman discloses a skin protective composition for topical application to protect human skin from infrared radiation. The composition contains titanium dioxide and mica or coated mica as its principal active reagents.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,756,905, entitled "INSECT-REPELLENT CAMOUFLAGE COMPOSITION", issued on Jul. 12, 1988 to J. Melnik discloses a composition for repelling insects and camouflaging the human skin. The insect repellent, N,N-diethyl-m-toluamide ("DEET"), and a camouflage pigment are combined along with an optional emulsifier to allow a single application to serve both the camouflage and insect repellent functions.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,590,118, entitled "LONG LASTING INSECT REPELLENT FILMS FOR SKIN AND OTHER SUBSTRATES", issued on Jun. 29, 1971 to J. A. Conrady, et al. discloses a long lasting insect repellent film for skin application. The active chemical agents are dissolved in interpolymer resins to provide a slow release system for the active chemical agents when spread and dried as a film on a human being. The coating can be applied by spraying or spreading and it is alleged to be easily removable with a soapy water solution.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,821,363, entitled "SUNSCREEN PREPARATION EMPLOYING ETHYLENE-MALEIC ANHYDRIDE COPOLYMERS", issued on Jan. 27, 1974 to A. S. Black, et al. discloses a gel of the acid of a cross-linked copolymer of ethylene-maleic anhydride that includes a sunscreen agent. The gel is alleged to be substantially free of any emulsifying agent.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,435,005, entitled "SKIN PROTECTIVE OINTMENT", issued on Jan. 27, 1948 to W. F. Huppke, et al. discloses a cream or ointment containing a film-former so that the cream or ointment forms a film on the wearer's skin. The cream or ointment may include an insect repellent or a sunscreen, or both. Preferably, the film former is a mixture of ethyl cellulose and shellac.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,853,423, entitled "AEROSOL SUN-SCREENING COMPOSITION", issued on Sep. 23, 1958 to A. L. La Via discloses an aerosol composition alleged to be useful in protecting against sunburn.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,477,467, entitled "INSECT REPELLENT", issued on Oct. 16, 1984 to K. Nishizawa, et al. discloses the use of DEET in combination with certain proton acceptors for the purpose of inhibiting the absorption of DEET into the wearer's skin.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,356,801, entitled "INSECT REPELLENT COMPOSITION", issued on Aug. 29, 1994 to B. V. Travis, et al. discloses an insect repellent composition in which four insect repellent compounds are combined to improve the effectiveness of the composition.
None of these previous efforts, however, provides the benefits provided by the present invention. Additionally, the prior art does not teach or suggest the present inventive combination of component elements, as disclosed and claimed herein. The present invention achieves its intended purposes, objectives and advantages over the prior art compositions through a new, useful and unobvious combination of component elements. The present invention is simple to use, it contains a minimum number of functioning ingredients, it has reasonable manufacturing, testing and packaging costs, and it uses only readily available materials.
In particular, the prior art does not teach a combination sunscreen and insect repellent composition that is a stable emulsion which, when on a wearer's skin, promotes waterproofing and maintains its SPF for protracted periods of time.
Although there have been many inventions related to sunscreen protection and insect repellent compositions, none of the prior art has provided an effective, low cost and reliable product which has achieved general use.